All work
CASE STUDY · CLIENT PROJECT · IN PROGRESS
NIZAM’S FRAGRANCES
Why do first-time visitors leave a small attar brand without buying? I expected the answer to be the website. The research said otherwise.
PROBLEM
A founder-led attar and perfume brand pays for Meta ads, but first-time visitors hesitate and buy from brands they already know.
MY ROLE
Solo designer working directly with the founder: UX audit, research, synthesis, and now the redesign.
METHODS
Heuristic UX audit, a founder questionnaire, a customer questionnaire with 6 people, affinity mapping and hypothesis testing.
TIMELINE
May 2026 to present · remote, working directly with the founder
6
fragrance buyers surveyed, plus the founder
0
participants described the site as a scam or fake
3 of 3
“no” answers gave positioning as the main reason, not visual polish
4 of 6
would spend ₹300 to 500 on an untried brand, about its price
ON THIS PAGE
The brief
Research
Hypothesis
Findings
The problem
Next steps
Reflection
THE BRIEF
In May 2026, the founder of Nizam’s Fragrances asked me for an honest review of his website. Nizam’s sells attars and perfumes inspired by Hyderabadi fragrance culture, and he wanted to know how the site looks, what works, what doesn’t, and whether I would buy from it.
I turned that into a 19-page UX audit, then proposed a structured redesign. We started working together in June 2026. This page covers the research so far; the redesign is still in progress.
CONSTRAINTS
A solo founder: he runs the brand alongside a full-time job, so every recommendation has to be something one person can keep running
No conversion data yet: the founder doesn’t track metrics, so there is no baseline and I can’t promise a number
Paid traffic: most visitors arrive from Meta ads and land on the homepage
Remote work: I work with the founder entirely online
WHAT I ASKED, AND WHO
I sent the founder a questionnaire about the business and his customers. Then I ran a customer questionnaire with 6 fragrance buyers. I sent them to the homepage to explore it, then asked about trust, price and what would make them buy. Five of them completed the questions about the site.
Source
What it can tell me
Founder questionnaire
Business facts, and his beliefs about customers, which aren’t evidence of what customers think
Customer questionnaire (6 people)
First impressions and buying habits: directional, not proof
My original audit
Where my hypothesis came from, not user evidence
LIMITS I’M HONEST ABOUT
All 6 participants were working professionals I recruited from my own network, and none described themselves as an attar buyer. One response read as AI-generated, so I never let it stand alone as evidence.
THE HYPOTHESIS I SET OUT TO TEST
Going in, I assumed the website was the problem: inconsistent layouts and colours, product pages that felt template-like, and reviews that looked overly positive and repetitive. My hypothesis: the website presentation creates enough doubt that people question whether the brand is credible.
The live site in October 2026. 1: a long product name pushes its price and button out of line with the rest of the row. 2: every product shows the same bottle; only the label changes. 3: every price is shown as a discount.
I split it into three separate claims and tested each one against what participants said.
My hypothesis, split into three claims I could test separately.
Claim
Verdict
Why
The site makes the brand look less premium
Supported
4 of 5 engaged participants said it didn’t look premium
The site makes people doubt the brand is real
Not supported
Nobody used scam, fake or fraud language
The site is why people don’t buy
Not supported
The three “no” answers cited attar (2) and lack of differentiation (1)
WHAT THE RESEARCH ACTUALLY SAID
Affinity map from my research synthesis. Click the map to open it full size.
IN A PARTICIPANT’S WORDS
“If I had to buy such a product, there are 15 other brands I could go to, why Nizams?”
Trust is settled off-site: most participants check Google, Reddit, YouTube or friends before buying from a new brand. The website’s job is to survive that check.
The barrier is “why Nizam’s?”, not “is Nizam’s real?”. People saw no reason to pick it over brands they already know.
It reads as attar-first: two perfume buyers opted out because the brand looked like an attar shop.
Heritage is seen, not believed: the traditional look lands, but the claim needs proof.
On-site reviews start low: two participants said the owner could write them.
The bottle, not the website: the most criticised visual was the physical packaging.
Reviews on the most-reviewed product: 23 reviews, all posted between 3 and 18 May 2026 (1), none with a customer photo (2). Reviewer names blurred.
REFRAMING THE PROBLEM
The problem moved from “the site looks untrustworthy” to this: first-time visitors who already buy from established brands get no believable reason to choose Nizam’s.
WHAT A FIRST-TIME VISITOR NEEDS
A reason to choose: something specific that sets Nizam’s apart from the 15 other brands they could buy from
Proof they can check: evidence of real customers and real craft, beyond reviews on the brand’s own site
A low-risk first purchase: a way to judge the scent before paying ₹400 to 500, the price of a 6 ml bottle, for a brand they haven’t tried
WHERE THE REDESIGN IS HEADING
These are the directions I’m proposing to the founder. Each one traces back to the research above.
Update, October 2026: the live site has since moved in two of these directions. It now offers 2 free attar samples and build-your-own tester packs, and product pages show longevity (14 to 20 hours) and a fragrance pyramid. What I’m testing now is whether these changes answer “why Nizam’s?”, or only make the brand easier to try.
Make the heritage visible: show the Hyderabadi story through the founder, the place and the process, not adjectives
Make reviews believable: real photos and clear sources, once we confirm where the current reviews came from
Help people predict a scent: clearer notes and longevity on every product
Lower the first-order risk: explore a trial size or sample set, since that was the clearest path to spending more
BEFORE I DESIGN
I’m closing three gaps first: checking the live product pages on mobile, getting the store’s basic analytics, and talking to 3 to 5 real buyers, who weren’t in my sample.
WHAT THIS HAS TAUGHT ME SO FAR
A first impression is a hypothesis: splitting mine into three claims showed which part actually held up.
The surprise was the useful part: positioning, not polish, came out as the real barrier.
Not every problem is a screen: the bottles and the constant discounts are business decisions. I’ll recommend them to the founder rather than claim them as design wins.
LET’S TALK.
I’m looking for product and UX design roles in Mumbai, remote, or where relocation makes sense. I reply within a day.
© 2026 Hiral Mamaniya
Designed and built in Framer
All work
CASE STUDY · CLIENT PROJECT · IN PROGRESS
NIZAM’S FRAGRANCES
Why do first-time visitors leave a small attar brand without buying? I expected the answer to be the website. The research said otherwise.
PROBLEM
A founder-led attar and perfume brand pays for Meta ads, but first-time visitors hesitate and buy from brands they already know.
MY ROLE
Solo designer working directly with the founder: UX audit, research, synthesis, and now the redesign.
METHODS
Heuristic UX audit, a founder questionnaire, a customer questionnaire with 6 people, affinity mapping and hypothesis testing.
TIMELINE
May 2026 to present · remote, working directly with the founder
6
fragrance buyers surveyed, plus the founder
0
participants described the site as a scam or fake
3 of 3
“no” answers gave positioning as the main reason, not visual polish
4 of 6
would spend ₹300 to 500 on an untried brand, about its price
The brief
Research
Hypothesis
Findings
The problem
Next steps
Reflection
THE BRIEF
In May 2026, the founder of Nizam’s Fragrances asked me for an honest review of his website. Nizam’s sells attars and perfumes inspired by Hyderabadi fragrance culture, and he wanted to know how the site looks, what works, what doesn’t, and whether I would buy from it.
I turned that into a 19-page UX audit, then proposed a structured redesign. We started working together in June 2026. This page covers the research so far; the redesign is still in progress.
CONSTRAINTS
A solo founder: he runs the brand alongside a full-time job, so every recommendation has to be something one person can keep running
No conversion data yet: the founder doesn’t track metrics, so there is no baseline and I can’t promise a number
Paid traffic: most visitors arrive from Meta ads and land on the homepage
Remote work: I work with the founder entirely online
WHAT I ASKED, AND WHO
I sent the founder a questionnaire about the business and his customers. Then I ran a customer questionnaire with 6 fragrance buyers. I sent them to the homepage to explore it, then asked about trust, price and what would make them buy. Five of them completed the questions about the site.
Founder questionnaire
WHAT IT CAN TELL ME
Business facts, and his beliefs about customers, which aren’t evidence of what customers think
Customer questionnaire (6 people)
WHAT IT CAN TELL ME
First impressions and buying habits: directional, not proof
My original audit
WHAT IT CAN TELL ME
Where my hypothesis came from, not user evidence
LIMITS I’M HONEST ABOUT
All 6 participants were working professionals I recruited from my own network, and none described themselves as an attar buyer. One response read as AI-generated, so I never let it stand alone as evidence.
THE HYPOTHESIS I SET OUT TO TEST
Going in, I assumed the website was the problem: inconsistent layouts and colours, product pages that felt template-like, and reviews that looked overly positive and repetitive. My hypothesis: the website presentation creates enough doubt that people question whether the brand is credible.
The live site in October 2026. 1: a long product name pushes its price and button out of line with the rest of the row. 2: every product shows the same bottle; only the label changes. 3: every price is shown as a discount.
I split it into three separate claims and tested each one against what participants said.
My hypothesis, split into three claims I could test separately.
The site makes the brand look less premium
VERDICT
Supported
WHY
4 of 5 engaged participants said it didn’t look premium
The site makes people doubt the brand is real
VERDICT
Not supported
WHY
Nobody used scam, fake or fraud language
The site is why people don’t buy
VERDICT
Not supported
WHY
The three “no” answers cited attar (2) and lack of differentiation (1)
WHAT THE RESEARCH ACTUALLY SAID
Affinity map from my research synthesis. Click the map to open it full size.
IN A PARTICIPANT’S WORDS
“If I had to buy such a product, there are 15 other brands I could go to, why Nizams?”
Trust is settled off-site: most participants check Google, Reddit, YouTube or friends before buying from a new brand. The website’s job is to survive that check.
The barrier is “why Nizam’s?”, not “is Nizam’s real?”. People saw no reason to pick it over brands they already know.
It reads as attar-first: two perfume buyers opted out because the brand looked like an attar shop.
Heritage is seen, not believed: the traditional look lands, but the claim needs proof.
On-site reviews start low: two participants said the owner could write them.
The bottle, not the website: the most criticised visual was the physical packaging.
Reviews on the most-reviewed product: 23 reviews, all posted between 3 and 18 May 2026 (1), none with a customer photo (2). Reviewer names blurred.
REFRAMING THE PROBLEM
The problem moved from “the site looks untrustworthy” to this: first-time visitors who already buy from established brands get no believable reason to choose Nizam’s.
WHAT A FIRST-TIME VISITOR NEEDS
A reason to choose: something specific that sets Nizam’s apart from the 15 other brands they could buy from
Proof they can check: evidence of real customers and real craft, beyond reviews on the brand’s own site
A low-risk first purchase: a way to judge the scent before paying ₹400 to 500, the price of a 6 ml bottle, for a brand they haven’t tried
WHERE THE REDESIGN IS HEADING
These are the directions I’m proposing to the founder. Each one traces back to the research above.
Update, October 2026: the live site has since moved in two of these directions. It now offers 2 free attar samples and build-your-own tester packs, and product pages show longevity (14 to 20 hours) and a fragrance pyramid. What I’m testing now is whether these changes answer “why Nizam’s?”, or only make the brand easier to try.
Make the heritage visible: show the Hyderabadi story through the founder, the place and the process, not adjectives
Make reviews believable: real photos and clear sources, once we confirm where the current reviews came from
Help people predict a scent: clearer notes and longevity on every product
Lower the first-order risk: explore a trial size or sample set, since that was the clearest path to spending more
BEFORE I DESIGN
I’m closing three gaps first: checking the live product pages on mobile, getting the store’s basic analytics, and talking to 3 to 5 real buyers, who weren’t in my sample.
WHAT THIS HAS TAUGHT ME SO FAR
A first impression is a hypothesis: splitting mine into three claims showed which part actually held up.
The surprise was the useful part: positioning, not polish, came out as the real barrier.
Not every problem is a screen: the bottles and the constant discounts are business decisions. I’ll recommend them to the founder rather than claim them as design wins.
LET’S TALK.
I’m looking for product and UX design roles in Mumbai, remote, or where relocation makes sense. I reply within a day.
© 2026 Hiral Mamaniya
Designed and built in Framer